My Mother the Star
by Angel31
Summary: Law & Order vs. Bullets Over Broadway...Nora tells Jack about her mother, Helen Sinclaire! Please R


The Law & Order Verses Series

Dianne Wiest Movies

By 

Mary

NOTE: YES, I am perfectly aware that Dianne/Nora was NOT even thought of in Helen Sinclaire's time…it's just a story, so PRETEND that it makes sense okay? LOL…ENJOY IT!

Story One: Law & Order Vs. Bullets Over Broadway

She had been sworn into office, had breakfast with the mayor, was introduced to her staff and it was not even noon yet. Nora Lewin started to unpack the boxes that she had had delivered to her new office at Hogan Place. It was not going to be an easy task taking over for Adam Schiff, but it was a challenge and she was more excited about now that she actually stood in her office than when she was when Rudy Gulliani asked her to cover for Adam. Being District Attorney had been her dream since she started law school and now it was coming true. 

She sat in the middle of the floor and carefully tore the packaging tape off of one of the boxes, then slowly removed each tissue paper covered frame. For three weeks, interior decorators had been getting the office ready for her, but nothing could make it more perfect than her pictures. Her family history held in time by photographs. 

"Hey boss," Jack McCoy smiled from the doorway. "Can I come in?" he asked.

Nora looked up from her box and smiled, "of course you may! Join me."

He walked across the room and sat beside her on the floor, "ah, settling in I see."

"I just wanted to have some pieces of home with me while I'm here," she started to remove the tissue paper from the frames, and wipe them with a cloth. 

"Show me who the people are?" he asked.

She held up a picture of two young children posing for the camera, "my daughters."

"They're as cute as their mom!" he grinned.

She giggled and picked up another photo, "my dogs; Mickey, Pluto and Donald…"

Jack laughed, "Mickey, Pluto and Donald?"

"Yes. So, I like Disney movies!" she said.

She continued to show him the photos and find places for them to go. Her family photos she kept on the shelves behind her desk, the photos of her friends and pets she hung around the room or put on the smaller tables near the sofa and chairs. 

"Hey, who's this?" he asked holding up an old black and white photo. The frame was bent and dusty.

"Oh, I've been looking for that forever! I wonder how that got in here," she took it from him and smiled. "This is my Mother, Helen."

"Helen…"Jack thought, he remembered the story that Nora had told him years ago of her mother. She was a great actress on Broadway who had an affair with a writer of one of the plays she starred in. "Helen Sinclaire!"

"Yes!" Nora smiled. 

"Tell me her story again?"

Nora sat on the sofa with her mother's picture close to her, "she was a great star on Broadway in her day, but she fell into a slump of forgettable plays and was very unhappy. The play that my father wrote is the one that boosted her career again. They were very close for a while, but he ended their affair and went back to his fiancée," she sighed. "I was ten years old when I found out who he was. I had three step-fathers by that time and I guess that my mother figured it was time that I had my real father."

"It must have been hard for you growing up, getting used to three different fathers," Jack said.

"My mother never kept them long enough for me to get to know them," she said with a laugh. "She was a good woman; a little eccentric. I remember when I was a little older and she would refer to one of her husbands, it would never be by name, but a characteristic of one, like her second husband, John, she called him 'the one with the mustache,'" 

Jack laughed. "Sounds like she was a great lady!"

"Oh, she was!" Nora smiled, almost child like. "I remember when I was little, watching her on stage…it was so magical to me…

__

Nora sat on a little chair next to her mother's vanity and watched her as she applied her make up. She loved watching her mother and hoped that someday she would be just like her. 

"Nora, sit up straight!" Helen said getting up from her chair. 

Nora sat up straight and looked up at her mother, "can I watch you tonight Mommy? Please? I'll be quiet, I promise," she pleaded. 

"As long as your quiet," she took Nora's hand and they walked together to the stage. She took a little chair out from a broom closet and set it behind the curtain, making sure her daughter would have a good view of the stage. "There you are darling, sit here and you can watch."

"Thank you Mommy!" Nora said, taking her seat excitedly. She held her teddy bear in her arms and watched the audience taking their seats as well. Nora hated talking in front of so many people and wish she had her mother's courage to perform. 

"You're Welcome," she patted Nora's cheek, and went back to her dressing room to prepare. 

Within minutes she returned in a grand purple gown, shouting orders at the stage- hands and other actors. Nora smiled at the way everyone fell all over her mother. They worshiped her and did as she said. 

The lights went out in the audience and music began to flow from the pit. "Places everyone!" the director called, "Places!"

Helen led the way of the actors and sat on a chair in the middle of the stage. Other actors gathered around her while others mingled in other parts of the stage. Helen smiled and nodded to her daughter and Nora waved back.

The curtain rose and the play began…

Nora became mystified by the play, not taking her eyes off of the actors for a moment. She held her teddy bear on her lap as if it were also engaged in the play. When act one ended she watched the audience stand and applaud her mother and stood with them, jumping up and down and clapping. The curtain fell and Helen walked off, tossing a bundle of roses to her maid, "put these in water," she said. The maid nodded and ran off to find a vase.

"Mommy, that was fun!" Nora said as Helen started towards her dressing room, "the peoples were clapping and laughing all for you!"

"That's what I do sweet heart," Helen said as she went behind a curtain to change. "Actors make the audience laugh, and cry. We take them away from their dull boring little lives for a few hours."

Nora climbed onto Helen's vanity chair and started to play with her make up, pretending she was an actress. She sat her bear next to her on the table and started to examine all of the little pieces of makeup. 

"Oh, Nora, no, no, no," Helen went to her daughter and picked her up off of her chair, "you're too young to wear make up!"

"I want to be like you, Mommy!" Nora protested.

Helen sighed and sat at her vanity, "alright, just this once!" 

Nora climbed up on her lap and looked in the mirror as Helen started to apply some lipstick to her face, "make a fish face," Helen said. Nora did so and Helen drew some on, "now, move your lips together, good girl."

"Helen, five minutes!" the director said, poking his head in the dressing room.

"Just a minute!" she snapped at him, "I'm busy!" She picked up the powder and lightly dabbed it on Nora's face, the child giggled with delight at the way it sent clouds of powder up in the air.

"There, how is that?" Helen asked.

"Thank you Mommy!" Nora said looking at herself in the mirror. 

"My pretty little girl!" Helen hugged her daughter and took her hand, leading her back to her seat. 

" She would go from being my Mother to an entirely different person…it was just so wonderful," Nora said, lost in the memory.

Jack looked at the picture and then back at Nora, "you look a lot like her you know? The eyes, nose…" he laughed, "it's like your twins."

"I don't see any resemblance," she said getting up and putting the photograph on her desk. "I was never pretty like her. I never had the guys falling all over me like her. Even when she was older…in her sixties, she had a boyfriend for everyday of the week," Nora smiled softly and sighed. "I didn't even have one guy to take to my senior prom!"

Jack went to her side and put his arm around her, "no, you're not pretty, Nora," he said bluntly.

She looked up at him, surprised that he would say such a thing, and a hurt that he would say it to her face. "Thank you, Jack, for pointing that out!" she frowned.

"You're beautiful," he smiled.

She smiled shyly and looked away, "that's the first time anyone has ever said that to me. "Thank you."

"I only speak the truth," he grinned.

They stared briefly into each others eyes, Nora turned out her desk light, and they walked out side by side.

The End


End file.
